4.1 Spec Discussion
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Fire
PTR data shows the current Ignite munching fix has actually caused a dps drop of about 200. The fix has done its job in reducing the amount that gets eaten, but the overall damage change has been a negative effect.
Fire is still a very RNG spec and shows the highest variance between high dps and low dps. It does however still command the AoE, again depending on lucky crits and procs.
Gearing will still lean towards a crit/haste balance, with our haste value dependant on gaining extra dot ticks.
Frost
Frostbolt damage increased by 10%.
Blizzard damage increased by 70%.
Fingers of Frost Ice Lance damage has been increased from 15 to 25% damage.
Frost actually shows up higher than Fire on movement fights with the ability to Ice Lance, Pet Freeze, Deep Freeze, etc. It is our most reliable form of AoE as Blizzard is a set and forget ability. Also, a decent survivability change, Ice Barrier base absorption value has been increased by 120%.
Gearing is similar to Fire, once you reach the Shatter cap (33.34% crit), haste and mastery will balance one another out.
Arcane
Still a turret, Arcane suffers heavily on movement fights, but will decimate other specs on Patchwerk encounters.
The haste cap is an issue with Arcane as the cast time on Arcane Blast has been changed from 2.35 to 2.0 seconds. AoE is a mixed bag, as Arcane Explosion damage has been increased by 30% and has been tied in with the Arcane Blast buff. To AoE effectively as arcane, one must be in melee range (although talents cause 80% threat reduction on Arcane Explosion) and follow a rotation of sorts (keep Arcane Blast stack up while filling with Arcane Explosion). Furthermore, Arcane Missiles and Arcane Barrage damage has been increased by 13%.
Gearing will balance out haste/mastery while crit falls far behind.
Summary:
Fire and Frost are the two most alike specs as far as gearing goes. Arcane will find itself looking for two distinctly different stats. Depending on our raid comp (ret pally/bm hunter?) an arcane mage will be necessary, and should be competitive on most fights. I personally find fire to be more frustrating than anything, and am leaning towards Arcane for a "fun" factor. Arcane will be easy to play, but very difficult to excel at. Frost seems to be the most reliable spec and provides the most survivability.
What spec are you leaning towards in 4.1 and why?
My gut reaction for the arcane changes is to gear mastery and crit. With arcane blast being our main source of damage I feel like haste really isn't that necessary... I would probably aoe with blizzard on magmaw and cho'gall. Halfus would still be fire, unless arcane explosion spam can somehow beat fire aoe.
Haste is still very useful for Arcane as it will allow Arcane Blast to hit harder, and quicker.
I'm looking forward to upcoming raid content though. What specs do you guys feel will be dominant in 4.2 and onward?
Frost by a mile.
Once the soft cap gets reached (which will be so easy in 4.2), i can switch to Mage Armor without a dps loss and cast blizzard without sweating.
With the predicted higher dps on helter-skelter, and the fact that the skill cap for frost is much higher than fire, it should be extremely helpful for progressing, and getting better as a player.
I'm looking forward to upcoming raid content though. What specs do you guys feel will be dominant in 4.2 and onward?
TBQH it all depends on the set bonuses for t12, and the types of encounters in firelands. I think the specs are close enough that i can say that.
We all know that the set bonuses were targeted COMPLETELY at fire, i hope they will benefit the other two more in 4.2
Honestly I dont really know what to spec right now.
Fires changes got me excited, but in the end it made it worse. I would assume some buff would come in during the future but its hard to tell.
I run a 10 man group and we do not carry anything that has the 3% increased damage. With the new arcane changes I took my offspec into arcane for the sake of less movement/aoe fights. The problem is, I dont have many gearing options to help with arcane. Most of my gear is focused on fire with a few off pieces that I can use with an arcane set (boa ring / theralions mirror)
Frost it seems may be the best spec to go with, but im not sure how much I can trust its aoe. Also to note, we are currently working on heroic magmaw, and I solo kite/kill the adds. working with that as frost or arcane is just a big NO st@!*%d onto it.
So I think I will stick with fire and try out some arcane and see how it works with my current gear I guess. Why cant fire just be top end again!
Arcane is the deal
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